Singaporeans brace for bad news as Lee Kuan Yew’s health worsens

[EndoftheWorld]

Toh Han Shih

PUBLISHED : Wednesday, 18 March, 2015, 11:34pm
UPDATED : Wednesday, 18 March, 2015, 11:47pm

Singaporeans brace for bad news as Lee Kuan Yew’s health worsens

Toh Han Shih [email protected]

Lee Hsien Loong's Facebook profile. Photo: SCMP Pictures

As the health of Singapore's founding father Lee Kuan Yew continues to worsen, citizens are preparing for the worst.

President Tony Tan Keng Yam postponed a week-long trip to Mexico originally scheduled to begin tomorrow, according to well-placed sources.

And in a telltale indication, his eldest son, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, changed his Facebook profile picture from a smiling photograph to a mournful, more sombre image of himself.

The image attracted thousands of messages from the online community, mostly expressing their support and sympathy.

Since February 5, the elder Lee has been in hospital for severe pneumonia, and dependent on mechanical ventilation, in the intensive care unit (ICU) of Singapore General Hospital.

Doctors have said that generally, any 91-year-old patient on a ventilator for about four weeks had a very guarded prognosis.

Many police, reporters and photographers were yesterday already beginning to gather around the hospital.

The prime minister also posted an official statement from his office on Facebook yesterday saying: "Mr Lee Kuan Yew remains critically ill in the ICU and has deteriorated further."

The bleak update came only a day after the Prime Minister's Office issued a statement declaring the legendary former leader's condition "has worsened due to an infection".

A Singaporean doctor confirmed the bleak outlook, saying: "What is worrying is the pace of the announcement has quickened. It used to be roughly every week. Now it's every day.

"From the rapid pace of the negative announcements, you can tell that things are turning pessimistic."

Lee Kuan Yew is widely credited with transforming Singapore from an economic backwater into one of Asia's wealthiest economies.

He was prime minister from 1959 to September 1963, while the city was under British colonial rule, and then until August 1965 when it was part of Malaysia.

He oversaw Singapore's separation from Malaysia and became its first leader as an independent city-state, governing until 1990.

Additional reporting by Agence France-Presse